Week 8: Economics Homework Has Taken Over My Life

On Monday I turned in the title and abstract of my final presentation. I had been working on it with Midhat the pervious week, but submitted it that morning. Later that day, I sent the draft of December's profile to her that morning as well. I'm hopeing to get it back by the following Monday. After work that day I helped Charlotte play a game of chess against Jaden. I hadn't played chess in a long time, but Charlotte had never played so I was stil able to help some. Later that evening, I played minecraft with some friends from highschool. It was a ton fo fun to catch up with them over something we all enjoy. Even later the nigth I fried some papusas from Costco. They are defeintly not authentic, but still delicious.

I then continued work on Jan's profile on Tuesday morning and got a very solid outline of what I want to talk about. That afternoon was my intro to bouldering class, so after that I went to Costco with Reidyn for some dinner. Once I was all cleaned up, I went to Jaden's room to meet up with everyone for a celebration of Kaden being free from his worm. He had some gastrointestinal issues for the past several weeks that we had lovingly refered to as his worm, but now that he was more regular we celebrated his freedom with a cake! Maybe one of the strangeest things I've celebreated, but it was a great excuse to get together.

On Wedensday I continued work on Jan's profile and had a "lunch and learn" hosted by SPS. It was an opportnity to learn about one of the jounralists that works on FYI, AIP's science policy newsletter. Then that afternoon was suposed to be an interview with a physicist for a new profile, but some unreal circumstances forced us to cancel. After my check-in with Midhat, I did a little more work and headed home. That evening, Kaden, Charlotte, and I went for a run in the rain. It was super nice to get out and run, it had been a few weeks since the last time. Then I had to start working on some economics homework. While I have have a whole week of class after this week, I have my final paper due on Sunday along with the regular weekly homework and quiz.

Thursday was alomst completely filled with an amazing tour of NIST. I learned a lot about what NIST actually does. I knew their work was important, but I couldn't have told you what exactly they were doing. One of the places we got to see was the forensics balistics lab where they study how the markings on fired bullets can be uesd to match a bullet to a gun. We also got to see the 1,000,000 pound dead weight that they have. I had never considered how masses that high were callibrated, but now I know! I can not overstate how cool Thursday was. (Special thanks to Jenna and Charlotte for organizing the event for us!)

Friday was a much mroe typical day than Thursday, but still productive. I read through a few profiles to try to understand why they had been taken down in the past. Then that evening a group of us went to Ben's Chili Bowl and played a game of Catan. This was the second time I had played it recently and I lost again, but I lost way less badly than the time before. I then continued to work on my economics work and went to bed.

Saturday morning Kaden, Charlotte, and I went for a run. It may have been the longest run I've ever recorded at just under 6 miles. While the run was great, i really messed up my foot. I tripped twice on the same foot and my arch was extremely unhappy with me. After the run, we went to Tatte to treat ourselves to some breakfast and the rest of my day was again filled with economics, except for a few hours where a group of us went to a Nationals baseball game.

Sunday was again much more economics, but I did take a break to enjoy a wonderful Italian dinner that Jenna had prepared. It was a great break from the mind melting work of economics research. That evening, I finished my final paper and went to bed.

While the week was bogged down by school work, we all did so many fun things together!